


A Letter, Unsent

by sinkauli



Category: 14th and 15th Century CE Religious Women RPF
Genre: Christian Character, Epistolary, F/F, Hands, Mysticism, Religious Imagery & Symbolism, Resolved Sexual Tension
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-11-06
Updated: 2020-11-06
Packaged: 2021-03-09 01:02:29
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,078
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27416215
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/sinkauli/pseuds/sinkauli
Summary: Julian writes to an old friend, but it gets out of hand and the letter never leaves her writing-desk.
Relationships: Margery Kempe & Julian of Norwich
Comments: 8
Kudos: 12
Collections: Yuletide 2020





	A Letter, Unsent

**Author's Note:**

  * For [notearchiver](https://archiveofourown.org/users/notearchiver/gifts).



> ... in every soul that shall be saved is a Godly Will that never assented to sin, nor ever shall. (Julian of Norwich, Revelations of Divine Love, Thirteenth Revelation, Chapter XXXVII)

* * *

(Norwich, 1417)

My dearest sister in Christ, Margery:

The news of your recent pilgrimage reached me this morning, and with that news the bringer of it. She had been described to me as "fourteen years of age, plain and scholarly, in possession of a modest dowry and plentiful brothers, admirably suited for the convent", and I never thought she was your Cecily until I saw the reflection of your face in hers.

She came to me for learning, just as you did these four years ago. I told her the same that I told you then, that the life of an anchorite would not suit her -- rather than telling her that she was not suited for that life, though that is also equally true for her as it is for you. Unlike you she has no family to care for, and her scholarship won't go amiss -- the Lord knows I need a confidential scribe, and I can keep her close to me until she shows aptitude for one thing more than another. Perhaps we will set her to learn physick, herb-lore, history, astrology, whatever God has given her, after she settles down to the rhythm of the convent.

She put her hands in mine, trusting, and I saw the ink-stains too dark to wash away and felt the calluses from the pen and knew that those hands would be wasted on sewing or embroidery, or worse, gardening or laundry. There are others who have those talents. She offered do my mending -- and I am sure that she can, I trust that you taught her well enough -- but my maid Alice can do that, and Cecily's with it as needed.

* * *

The afternoon I spent counselling -- and perhaps consoling -- a maiden barely older than Cecily but less learned and much more sheltered, who has been promised to a local lordling's son in marriage and sought my advice. As always I had to resist the temptation to say that I am a nun and have no experience of marriage -- she is likely to know that and still comes to me. It may be her mother who sent her, or her intended's mother, loath to speak frankly to the girl themselves. I think she went away reassured at least, with some confidence that whatever may befall her in marriage she can always depend on the love of our Lord Jesus Christ, even when mortals fail her. I expect that she will be back for further counsel when there is more to her life than mere apprehension and speculation.

Why women come to me for counsel in their marriage is always a mystery, me being a consecrated virgin. I have no knowledge that may help them, except possibly the knowledge stemming from my visions, but I am always cautious not to be too candid about those, especially with young women who lack all experience. May God give that my words can nourish their minds, even as their bodies will nourish their children, and I pray that at least some of of my counsel will fall on good ground and yield a hundredfold.

When you came to me, Margery, you had of course already been married for a long time, and had no need of my counsel on that subject; quite the contrary, as you well know, and indeed I can and do use some of what you taught me then. No counsel will stand in for experience, though; and I tell them that, too, even as they tremble with fear of the unknown.

As for myself, I have been through death; my trepidation is not from fear of the unknown, but rather of what I have already seen when it was about to overwhelm me. My death of the body will bring no further agony, but contrariwise our Lord Jesus Christ shall fulfill my heart with His everlasting joy and bliss.

* * *

In the dark of the night all I could see was the red glimmer of the Presence light in the sanctuary. I heard Alice's regular breathing in the anteroom, and in the church the soft voice of the sister on the roster reading the Psalms. Knowing the Psalter by heart I often say the Psalms from my cell along with the sisters, but I was distraught, unable to still my mind for any contemplation. I considered lighting a candle to read or write, but both reading and writing would have needed more coherent thought than I thought myself capable of, and I lay on my bed writhing in woeful pain, beset by the awareness of my wretched nature. This lasted until the hour before Lauds, always the coldest and bleakest, when demons and spectres are afoot. My Lord Jesus came to comfort me with mercy and grace as He has done so often before, washing me in the stream of the holy blood of His Passion.

He took my hands in His then as I had taken Cecily's in mine, workman's hands with broad fingers, and it was all I could to do to trust Him, to give myself to Him completely. His face was as fair as the first time he had showed Himself to me in a vision, yet without the scourge of His Passion, because His purpose was to console me, to ease my plight of body and soul.

He laid me back on the bed and stroked the soles of my feet, my ankles, up my legs to the hips, the cage of my ribs, my dried-up old woman's breasts, my shoulders and neck, the back of my head, then down again to my secret places. When the ecstasy overcame me at last there was nothing in the world but God, not even myself. If Alice heard me at all, she would know that I am often in agony or ecstasy in the night, or both at once, and not be alarmed.

Margery, is it a sin to imagine that the hands that I caress myself with, that He uses to caress me with, are yours? If love is a sin, is my life a lie? Have I turned away from God by my sins even as He consoles me? But all things are done by the foreseeing wisdom of God, and all His doings are easy and sweet. You have your own tribulations, as I have mine; but God will keep you in His unending love, as He has kept me for so long.

\-- Your sister, Julian.

**Author's Note:**

> Thank you, notearchiver, this was such a joy to write!
> 
> "I am a nun, I have no experience of marriage" is from something a spiritual father once said to me, "I don't know about [sexual thing], I'm a monk!" (But we don't really know what experience she had before the age of thirty, do we?)


End file.
